Fridley gets $500,000 state grant for cleanup and redevelopment of former BAE site

Fridley has won a $500,000 state grant to clean up and redevelop the former BAE Systems site where a developer plans to build a business center on East River Road south of Interstate Hwy. 694.

The grant, from the state Department of Employment and Economic Development, will be used in the first of four phases proposed for the 122-acre site by developer Paul Hyde, said Scott Hickok, the city's community development director. He said a demolition landfill on the site will be removed and polluted soil cleaned out.

Hickok said Hyde plans to start work on a new office-warehouse building in the spring and hopes to complete it by the end of 2014. He said later phases will include demolishing the old BAE plant of almost 2 million square feet. The plant was built in the 1940s to manufacture gun mounts for the U.S. Navy and later was bought by FMC, which merged to become BAE.